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In our emails, sent once or twice a week, you'll receive:
• alerts on new threats to Georgia's environment
• opportunities to join other Georgians on urgent actions
• updates on the decisions that impact our environment
• resources to help you create a cleaner, greener future

Go Solar

While more of us are trying to go solar, dirty energy companies keep putting up new roadblocks. We’re urging our leaders to go big on solar and leave dirty energy behind.

It’s time for Georgia to go big on solar power

More of us are going solar, meeting our energy needs in a way that’s clean, local and independent. Consider:

Solar power has tripled in the U.S. in the last two years, with another American family or business going solar every four minutes.

That’s in part because the price of solar has dropped more than 50 percent since 2011.

The chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission said that “solar is growing so fast it is going to overtake everything...It could double every two years.”

Who's attacking solar?

Unfortunately, solar power’s rapid growth has alarmed some dirty energy companies. They keep putting up new roadblocks to solar -- so they can keep solar generating less than 3% of our power, even if it means more pollution and more global warming.

Here are just a few examples:

Charles and David Koch, owners of the oil conglomerate Koch Industries, and their allies have spent heavily to impose new taxes on homeowners who go solar – in effect, penalizing those who reduce their pollution and their carbon footprint.

The Edison Electric Institute, which represents electric utility companies, has teamed up with the American Legislative Exchange Council to dismantle state pro-solar laws in Kansas, North Carolina and Washington State, amid others.

Our report found all or nearly all of the states shared a set of smart policies in common, from strong clean energy standards to policies that let solar homeowners sell their extra power back to the utilities.

15 percent solar by 2030

We need more and better pro-solar policies, not fewer.

That’s why we’re urging Gov. Nathan Deal to make commitments that will help put Georgia on the road to 100% clean energy, with 15 percent solar by 2030.

Achieving this state goal would help move our country closer to the national goal of getting 10 percent solar by 2030. This would produce immediate and long-lasting benefits for our environment, including removing 280 million metric tons of carbon from the atmosphere by 2030—the equivalent of taking 59 million cars off the road.

Let's go big on solar

We think a combination of professional research and advocacy with community action can help Georgia go big on solar. Why? Our national federation has done it before.

Environment California spearheaded the campaign for that state’s Million Solar Roofs Initiative. In Massachusetts, we helped convince the state to set a goal of enough solar to power 50,000 homes – and then persuaded the state to raise the goal when it hit the original milestone ahead of schedule. We’ve also won pro-solar policies in Colorado, New Mexico, Minnesota, Arizona, New Jersey and North Carolina.

But we have a long way to go to reach solar power’s true potential.

It’s time to go big on solar. If we take the right steps today, we can harness more power from the sun so we can finally leave dirty energy behind. The sky really is the limit.

Issue updates

California Gov. Jerry Brown signed the landmark Senate Bill 100 (SB 100) today, setting the Golden State on a path to generate 100 percent of its electricity from renewable and zero-carbon sources such as solar and wind by 2045.

California’s flagship public university system, with 238,000 students across 10 campuses, will run completely on electricity from clean, renewable energy by 2025, the University of California Office of the President announced today. The announcement, a first from one of the nation’s largest public university systems, builds on commitments from the UC system to mitigate climate change and meet carbon neutrality goals.

The California state Senate passed Senate Bill 100 (SB 100) by today, affirming the state Assembly’s vote yesterday. SB 100, which would put the state on a path to generate 100 percent of its electricity from renewable and zero-carbon sources such as solar and wind by 2045, now heads to Gov. Jerry Brown’s desk for his signature.

After a landmark vote by its state Assembly, California is poised to join Hawaii and become the second state committed to generating 100 percent of its electricity from renewable and zero-carbon sources. If the state Senate votes in favor of the current version of Senate Bill 100, which has only minor changes to a bill the Senate already passed, and then Gov. Jerry Brown signs it, California will commit to a clear target of 100 percent clean electricity by 2045.

Atlanta, GA -- Today, the Trump administration announced new vehicle emission guidelines which roll back the existing Clean Car Standards. This regressive move will get rid of our nation’s best climate change mitigation program, which is cutting future carbon emissions more effectively than any other current federal policy. Preliminary calculations indicate this move could increase global warming emissions by 2.2. billion metric tons. It also threatens to worsen Georgia’s air quality—a report put out by Environment Georgia in June 2018 found that Atlanta had 118 dirty air days in 2016. This action betrays the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA)’s stated mission of protecting human health and the environment.